Count Hannibal

"Madame," he said stiffly, "a jest is an excellent thing. But pardon me

if I say that it is ill played on a fasting man."

Madame desisted from laughter that she might speak. "A fasting man?" she

cried. "And he has eaten two partridges!"

"Fasting from love, Madame."

Madame St. Lo held up her hands. "And it's not two minutes since he took

a kiss!"

He winced, was silent a moment, and then seeing that he got nothing by

the tone he had adopted he cried for quarter.

"A little mercy, Madame, as you are beautiful," he said, wooing her with

his eyes. "Do not plague me beyond what a man can bear. Dismiss, I pray

you, this good creature--whose charms do but set off yours as the star

leads the eye to the moon--and make me the happiest man in the world by

so much of your company as you will vouchsafe to give me."

"That may be but a very little," she answered, letting her eyes fall

coyly, and affecting to handle the tucker of her low ruff. But he saw

that her lip twitched; and he could have sworn that she mocked him to

Suzanne, for the girl giggled.

Still by an effort he controlled his feelings. "Why so cruel?" he

murmured, in a tone meant for her alone, and with a look to match. "You

were not so hard when I spoke with you in the gallery, two evenings ago,

Madame."

"Was I not?" she asked. "Did I look like this? And this?" And,

languishing, she looked at him very sweetly after two fashions.

"Something."

"Oh, then I meant nothing!" she retorted with sudden vivacity. And she

made a face at him, laughing under his nose. "I do that when I mean

nothing, Monsieur! Do you see? But you are Gascon, and given, I fear,

to flatter yourself."

Then he saw clearly that she played with him: and resentment, chagrin,

pique got the better of his courtesy.

"I flatter myself?" he cried, his voice choked with rage. "It may be I

do now, Madame, but did I flatter myself when you wrote me this note?"

And he drew it out and flourished it in her face. "Did I imagine when I

read this? Or is it not in your hand? It is a forgery, perhaps," he

continued bitterly. "Or it means nothing? Nothing, this note bidding me

be at Madame St. Lo's at an hour before midnight--it means nothing? At

an hour before midnight, Madame!"

"On Saturday night? The night before last night?"

"On Saturday night, the night before last night! But Madame knows

nothing of it? Nothing, I suppose?"

She shrugged her shoulders and smiled cheerfully on him. "Oh yes, I

wrote it," she said. "But what of that, M. de Tignonville?"